Is there a Liar in Us All???

Monday, December 10, 2012

It wasn't my weight that caused me to hit rock bottom.
It wasn't the junk food binges, the inactivity, the excessive alcohol and 2 packs of cigarettes per day to cope with my ever worsening fears and my waning enjoyment of life..

My lack of self love was my Achilles Heel.

In 2011, I'm certain I looked to most people like I was a pretty blessed and enviable person. I was healthy, had a million friends, I played in a very successful band that toured the world, and I'd just recently become engaged to the man of my dreams - a man it took me 50 years to meet.
Hunky dory, right?
Far from it.

When you get what you "want", but the messages from your heart are all along the lines of how much you don't deserve it, things are destined to spiral into disaster. They did. .

I'll not elaborate on the details but suffice it to say, I pushed my love away, pushed my friends away, beat my health into the ground, lost career credibility.
Lost myself.
All because of a Liar hidden deep inside of me that kept telling me: you're not worth it.

Turns out, all of those self-destructive patterns were a symptom, not a disease in themselves. The disease was my own inability to see myself as worthy.
What was my crime exactly? I was fat. OK. Granted, I'm a musician and we are held to ridiciulously tough standards by some of those who watch us perform. I have had people walk right up to me - more than once - and ask me: what makes you think we'd want to look at you? You're fat"..

It's like - because you're on a stage entertaining them, you're not really a person - you're a spectacle - and they're allowed to steer you in whatever direction THEY feel a spectacle should present themselves.

So ---- I guess -- for decades, I realize now, because I've been on the stage since I was four - I tailor-made myself to the whims of others, never stopping to consider that it was ME who had to look at ME in the mirror at the end of the day and be able to say, "I feel good about you. I love you".

"They" didn't take it from me. The Liar in me that said their opinion mattered more than mine is what robbed me.
Today, that ends. Another era is upon me: one in which I say what I am, what I'm not, what I should be, and what I dream of becoming. Joy is everywhere, and I've chosen to see pain. Possibilities are everywhere, and I've chosen to see limitations.
From now on, doors are wide open, Friends are everywhere. Good will abounds. Dreams can and do come true.
I realize all too clearly that my desire to habitually satiate - and therefore silence- my true self -with unhealthy food, alcohol, cigarettes - comes from the fact that I wasn't receiving enough pure joy from other sources. When we aren't ok with ourselves on a soul level, we pile more and more behaviors and substances and manipulation on top of one another until we truly have lost sight of who is under there, a worthy but scared little kid crying out: you never gave me a chance.

The Liar had her day. Her so-called coping strategies did nothing but serve to spiritually bankrupt me, ravage my physical body and leave me cold, alone and in need.

To that still, small inner voice: the voice of the real me, my authentic self: keep talking, baby.
I'm listening.

It is time for that Liar to be sent packing! Your are right that "They" didn't take it away from you, and I get annoyed with people who make the behavior of others an excuse for their own bad behavior. Yet, that said, the things others say and do can lay emotional scars that we have to counter, extra emotional baggage we have to dump.

It sounds like you are ready to dump the baggage and move into a healthier place, mentally and physically.

Let that little voice in you get louder and stronger. You are worthy of a good life. You are more than the sum of your own and other people's negative speak. You are strong. Your dreams can and will come true.

DIET_FRIEND
I am reading a memoir by Brett Butler published probably in the 1990s. She too struggled with cigarettes, drugs and alcohol, but got through it. I hope you are getting a grip on food, cigarette and alcohol abuse that is keeping you from recognizing your authentic self. I only have to deal with my eating. It's not easy being a fat teacher either. Kids are super-critical and mean.1459 days ago